Washington, DC-based artist Joey P. Mánlapaz was born in the Philippines and came to the United States as a young teen. She attended the George Washington University earning a Bachelor of the Arts degree in Fine Arts and Zoology (Pre-Medicine) and subsequently a Master of Fine Arts Degree in Painting.
Mánlapaz exhibits widely and receives numerous accolades for her unique form of painterly photorealism, a result of a combined interest in the strict photorealist styles of New York artists Tom Blackwell and Richard Estes and the deep psychological sensibility of Edward Hopper and visual thrill of Alfred Hitchcock. Her 2009 museum exhibition “Through the Looking Glass” at the Corcoran Gallery of Art featured her Reflections Series, highly complex paintings of reflections on glass storefront windows.
The DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, which presently owns 21 of her cityscapes, awarded Mánlapaz a 2014 Artist Fellowship for artistic merit. In 2013, the U.S. Library of Congress acquired her personal papers, correspondences, sketchbooks & exhibition memorabilia for permanent inclusion in the Asian American Pacific Islander Collection. Notably, former First Lady Laura Bush selected the artist to create the artwork for the 2003 National Book Festival. The original painting remains in the collection of the U.S. Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
Virtual Talk with Joey Manlapaz | An Artist’s Washington, DC: Turmoil in Ever-Changing Landscape
The DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, which presently owns 21 of her cityscapes, awarded Mánlapaz a 2014 Artist Fellowship for artistic merit. In 2013, the U.S. Library of Congress acquired her personal papers, correspondences, sketchbooks & exhibition memorabilia for permanent inclusion in the Asian American Pacific Islander Collection. Notably, former First Lady Laura Bush selected the artist to create the artwork for the 2003 National Book Festival. The original painting remains in the collection of the U.S. Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
Her paintings are widely collected in the U.S. and internationally by private and corporate art collectors, including Akridge (DC), Arnold & Porter LLP (DC), Ayala Corporation (Manila), Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll LLP (DC), Citizens Bank (VA), Clark Enterprises (MD), Mr & Mrs Bill Cosby, DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities, Deloitte & Touche USA LLP (DC), ING Clarion (DC), Honorable (late) Senator Daniel Inouye (HI), International Union of Operating Engineers (DC), Melrose Castle (VA), Metlife (DC), Ministry of Justice (Manila), The Monocle Restaurant (DC), National Association of Home Builders (DC), Mr Mel Odilao (DC), ORIX Development Group (IL), Honorable Associate Judge Heidi M. Pasichow (DC), Pritchard Satellite Communications (MD), Reed Smith Shaw & McClay LLP (DC), Shapiro Lifschitz & Schram, P.C. (DC), Sidley & Austin LLP (IL), Superior Court of the District of Columbia, U.S. Library of Congress, U.S. Navy, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (MD), U.S. State Department, White & Case LLP (DC) and Wiley Rein & Fielding LLP (DC), to name a few.